Comments ( 45 )

• The 18th and Halsted area is so depressing for one reason…un-fullfilled hope. There are some incredible spaces if you walk through the back yards, etc. Yet there are many of forces at work to kill this.

  One one hand, You have a precarious position where you have one property owner who owns of all those buildings (each of his buildings had the orange & blue placard for address), who in my opinion, runs them like slums. Yes there is a ‘psuedo’ art district, but artists are transient low maintenance renters that do not care or complain. If he does not rent, why should he care, the buildings have been owned for generations and are probably paid off. (my understanding is the same owner tore down a L. Sullivan building recently)

  On top of that you have a neighboring community that wants home prices to remain low, rich in reverse discrimination attiude, openly saying they do not want “white people”, despite Pilson’s roots in European residents. Then you have and Alderman that does not care as well.

  There is no reason why this section of Halsted should not be one of the most thriving restauraunt & entertainment locations, yet most of the incredible spaces on Halsted sit vacant.
  Why did the city bother to replace all of the curbs, street lights, roads, etc. if people are going to tank the neighborhood?

• I applaud Joe Zekas’ efforts to capture Pilsen, but for obvious reasons, he failed. The drive by helps to see the whole of the neighborhood, but hardly its parts.

  Any discussion of East Pilsen as having whites is moot and just like Jeff said, the area is at a standstill because of one family that owns the majority of the neighborhood.

  The interesting thing to see in Pilsen is the area west of Racine where new businesses continue to open. These are not the ones rooted in Hispanic lore. There are a lot of empty spaces along this stretch. But my take on it is that the Mexican businesses that used to operate there do not have the money to continue on, based largely on a decrease in Mexican residents, and its proximity to the Little Village commercial strips, and an increase in “Anglos.” The new businesses that have opened up are geared toward that changing demographic of white hipster/upwardly-mobile Hispanic.

  Examples?

  Revolver Records
  Efebos Coffee
  Thrill Jockey Records
  Cafe Jumping Bean
  Soy Organic
  Take Me Out (Let’s eat Chinese!)
  Honky Tonk BBQ
  Mestiza
  Knee Deep
  OMD Boutique
  BonBon
  Zapatillas Shoes

  Remember too that there are numerous artist’s spaces throughout with absolutely no connection to the Podmajersky family.

  Coming Soon?
  18th Street Cafe (960-62 W 18th St)
  An Italian restaurant in Thalia Hall

• Uicstudent,

  Most of the “new businesses” you cite have been in place for years. It’s a positive note for Pilsen that they’ve been able to survive for some period of time.

  I may have failed at capturing Pilsen – a community that’s too complex to comprehend in a few hours – but I did what I set out to do, i.e. see whether there’s much visible evidence of change in Pilsen over the past two years. There isn’t.

• With all due respect Joe, you are wrong. Let’s start with the list of businesses. Please note that the only businesses in existence prior to your last visit are a mere three:

  Revolver Records (2 years)
  Efebos Coffee (2 years)
  Thrill Jockey Records (2 years)
  Cafe Jumping Bean (12 years)
  Soy Organic (8 months)
  Take Me Out (Let’s eat Chinese!) (3 months)
  Honky Tonk BBQ (9 months)
  Mestiza (3 years)
  Knee Deep (3 months)
  OMD Boutique (9 months)
  BonBon (10 years)
  Zapatillas Shoes (9 months)

  Let us also broaden the area of Pilsen and include Cafe Aorta, the Flower Shop, and a host of other galleries. If we also include what is rumored to be coming, there seems to be a trend in that which is catered to a different clientele than that which has thrived in Pilsen since the early-60s.

  18th Street Cafe (960-62 W 18th St)
  An Italian restaurant in Thalia Hall

  As I said earlier, there are more than 30 galleries that are part of the Pilsen Art Walk (not related to the Podmajerskys). When you start putting all of this together, it indicates a change. Whether or not you see it with your own eyes for the limited amount of time you spent in the area, the change is real.

• UICstudent,

  The last time I spent several ldays in Pilsen was December 06 / January 07. Most of the businesses on your list were in existence then, as evidenced by photos I posted at Flickr.

  I don’t know where your dates come from – Soy Organic, e.g., was reviewed on Yelp 3 months before you say it opened.

  It’s a wise policy, given the history, to wait for anything at Thalia Hall to open before touting it.

  I pointedly avoided the Pilsen Arts District – we’ve been writing about it in our publications for nearly 20 years now – 20 years of imminent change.

  Do you really believe that a few storefront restaurants, record stores and “vintage” clothing outlets add up to very much in the scale of Pilsen? Isn’t there at least a 1:1 ratio between closings and openings over the past several years along 18th St?

  Take another look at my videos, and survey Pilsen block by block. Was someone hiding all the new construction and rehab dumpsters and foundatons and fencing and site signage while I was in Pilsen? Change is sporadic and sparse by any serious measure.

  When you’ve been hearing “Pilsen is about to turn the corner” stories for as long as I have it takes more than you’re offering to make a case for it.

• I am not saying that anything is opening at Thalia Hall. As you should probably note, I put a question mark after it, as if it were still a rumor.

  As for the Soy Organic comment, what does it matter that I’m off by three months? Sounds like some serious knit-picking on your part. What is three months? What are the white businesses in Pilsen that have closed over the last >>>>> ???? years?

  I understand what you are saying about Pilsen turning the corner and the rumors behind it. The thing is that it actually is. UIC and rising rents have a lot to do with that. So too does the proximity to downtown and its easily accessible public transportation. There is a reason that the immigrant-centric businesses are failing and the upwardly-mobile ones aren’t.

  It’s very difficult to see what is going on in the neighborhood when you are driving around in a car. It is very difficult to adequately guage just what is going on in a neighborhood when you start your video tour at 18th and Blue Island with Mexican polka music blasting from your own car. Very cute. Can we call you a racist?

• UICstudent,

  Is that your final analysis? You’d get an F- if you stood by that in one of your classes.

  I drove around, walked around, hung around. Many visits to Pilsen and similar communities over many years, and direct involvement in attempts to change communities over an extended period of time add up to a different perspective than you might have.

  If you’d been 3 feet away from my car you would have heard nothing – certainly not “blasting.” A sensitive mic picks up low volume music.

  No one who knows anything about me would call me a racist, but reality doesn’t seem to be your strong suit, so go ahead.

• I did a lot of research for DePaul in Pilsen for about 3 months a year ago, and while there seemed to be some changes going on, the neighborhood felt purely Mexican. I have to agree with Joe, the landscape that I saw was purely Mexican. While there also is some gentrification to be seen here and there, it is nothing compared to the rate of what Humboldt Park and Logan Square are experiencing.

  I think UIC might contribute to further on going gentrification, but from what I saw a year ago, Pilsen seems to be gentrifying, but extremely slow when compared to other Latino dominant neighborhoods.

• Wow. you guys need to calm down. I don’t think you want this to turn this into a YouTube style discussion board, do you?

  Joe, I am someone who might fit your observer’s description as a hipster, (though I’d prefer the term artist/musician) I have lived on the same block in Pilsen for 2 years, and while this definately doesn’t make me any sort of authority on the area, I’d like to share my thoughts…

  I’d say that things are slowly trending in the way you describe, but in the time I’ve been here, I haven’t noticed any spiked acceleration of this trend. I think most areas of this city are going to have a ‘peppering’ (or salting in this case?) of young white artists that are displaced from the majority. It’s because we don’t have a lot of money, and we don’t mind being out of our element. I love Pilsen as it is and I’m not happy that it is slowly becoming a more gentrified area; and even that some would include me in the group of people to blame, but if new residents frequent the local grocery, restuarants, barbers, hardware stores, etc. rather than opt for the big chains that are moving in from all directions, I think it could go a long way towards preventing major change in the area. Am I off the mark? It’s the money and how we spend it that does the talking in this country, not the color of our skin.

  I’d encourage more videos of this kind in Pilsen, but I’d like to see more discussion with the locals and less generalizing salty comments from you about a group of people that are very difficult to pigeon-hole. No offense intended. Let the locals share their opinions, and if that’s what comes out of their mouth, so be it.

• It’s odd looking at the building which starts the segment looking so quiet. That building had around 80+ plus people living in it a few years ago. It was totally trashed. Now it’s quiet. That goes for all the good buildings which were vacant and trashed 5 years ago. Quiet. 5 years ago 18th Street was bustling, now it’s quiet. Joe seems to think that change is witnessed by the shops, it is they are quiet. Harvey’s no longer spills into the street with drunks. Most Taverns are now shut. Retail is the last sign of change, when it is all said and done. The change that occurred happened in many many of the biggest buildings in the worst condition, many which were vacant and trashed out are now renovated and lived in again and not by new immigrants or families.

  If you wanted to see Pilsen on a Saturday you most likely would not see it out and about here, maybe on the North Side, maybe shopping in Wicker Park, but 18th? For what? A haircut? Hardly.

  Remember Division Street when the surrounding residential was up and thriving? Nada. Leo’s Lunchroom was about it, most of the rest was tumbleweed and vacant storefronts.

  The funniest thing about change is that usually it is invisible and then everyone says “what happened”, people come and go in their cars in the alley. One family who lives half a block away and spent 540K on their house 2 years ago and then re-renovated it has never been seen by anyone on the block. Typical.

  Change in Pilsen? Absolutely. Easily visible by outsiders, no.

• PilsenSlav,

  Spell out the nature of that change for us, because it’s been invisible to virtually everyone who’s looked at Pilsen at any length and with any degree of objectivity – including a study less than three years ago (PDF) by the Urban Planning and Policy program at UIC. That study found demographic change occurring only in East Pilsen, east of Racine – and I deliberately avoided that area, looking for signs of change west of Racine.

  I traversed a lot more than 18th Street. I don’t agree with you that neighborhood change occurs in a nearly invisible fashion. Things get planted, painted, parked in front of and behind buildings, hung in windows, set out on porches, paraded in strollers, placed in garbage cans instead of strewn about etc. etc. etc. etc. People don’t move entirely in the alley system.

  You’re an insider – take this outsider around Pilsen and show me the changes.

• Wish I knew you had been around, I no doubt biked right by you. I always bike down to the bank on Saturday. This is my third neighborhood of “gentrication” and it follows the same pattern as the prior two but it’s different too, more urban, more invisible, there isn’t anywhere to plant. The federal grants for trees (Pilsen was one of the most foilage depleted neighborhoods in the USA hence the grants) are taking root.

  You might have enjoyed the picnic at Holy Trinity a few weeks back when the old Croats turned out in full force on Throop. Try the Skylark. The Rainbow of Pilsen, same owners. Look at Irv’s Bike Shop. Most of all, as always, look at the rental role. The census of 2010 will tell the tale. You are right, change at this stage is simply not on the radar, it never is.

  Try the Pilsen list on Yahoo.

  A few weeks back I went to an underground restaurant event in a garden here as a guest, most paid $75 a head. They will have another in August, after a couple in Wicker Park, splurge and join me.

  Wicker Park started “changing” in the mid 1960s, in the 80s people started to squawk, forty years after it started it’s visible. It takes time for people to die and move on to other pastures, Pilsen is no different. One thing I am sure of it is never going back to the disinvested mess it had become in our lifetime. We have finally put that era to rest.

  Sure, email me. I’ll show you my reality.

• Thanks, PilsenSlav. I’m out of the office most of tomorrow, so will get to you later in the day.

• “The funniest thing about change is that usually it is invisible and then everyone says “what happened”, people come and go in their cars in the alley. One family who lives half a block away and spent 540K on their house 2 years ago and then re-renovated it has never been seen by anyone on the block. Typical.”

  This sounds like the kind of myopia that people in the exurbs have; don’t want neighbors or to have anything to do with them if you do. It just struck me…

• So according to PilsenSlav’s timeline, we have another 30-40 years before Pilsen resembles the Wicker Park of today?

  My wife moved to Wicker Park in the mid-1990s as an art school graduate helping along the typical cycle of gentrification. The neighborhood had been the center of bohemian Chicago for quite some time by then, and it was still pretty crime-infested. I remember a lot of Latino residents still living there at that time. The changes in the last 10-15 years (which is since I’ve been paying attention to that area) have been staggering, and seemed to accelerate after some sort of tipping point and with the aid of the early 00s real estate boom. Pilsen has many many years before it will hit this tipping point, and another real estate boom will need to occur. I do think Pilsen will eventually gentrify, but I’d say it’s still decades away from becoming another Wicker Park-type neighborhood.

• PilsenSlav is right on the money. And, if you follow the logic used for Wicker Park, Pilsen is at that 20 year mark, placing it at just about the point Wicker Park was in the early-90s. As far as real estate investment is concerned, there will not be another boom for quite some time, at least as far as the condo and single-family madness we saw in the last decade is concerned. But within three to five years, you will see visible signs of change, with pockets of roughness dispersed throughout. And in 10 years, you are looking at Wicker Park circa 2002. Everything is in place but the stately mansions. And you will say “what happened?” But I’d say it will be more on the basis of renters in the area enjoying what the Bohemians-in-place have going now.

• UICstudent,

  If logic drove community change you might be right.

  You might want to share your “logic” with your department at your school – the study I linked above disagrees sharply with your view.

• UIC,

  Pilsen is not anywhere near where Wicker Park was in the early 90’s. Now the areas of Pilsen east of 1200 West or so do roughly resemble Wicker Park in the early 90’s. By resemble I mean by the pace of change or the point in the “change cycle”. Whatever the hell “change cycle” means. I spent a great deal of time and money on alcohol and North Avenue hookers in Wicker Park during that time period and it was further along than Pilsen is now.

  That being said I do think the pace of change in Pilsen is greater than Joe Zekas thinks and lesser than you think. Obviously most of the change is going on in the eastern end, but over time that will move west.

  Change takes time and generally it can’t really be seen over a short time period. I personally find 5 year increments a good measure of change.

  One impediment to change is the dominance of Mexican immigrants in the overall area. Other areas that have undergone gentrification largely didn’t have one dominant group. Lincoln Park, Lakeview, Bucktown, Wicker Park, and Uptown had fairly diverse populations before gentrification occurred. That made it more likely that newcomers would feel more welcome or at least less unwelcome.

  My experience in the glorious southern end of Uptown in the early 90’s was watching condo owners of all shades moving in. As I told people who would ask me questions as I was doing yardwork or sitting on my porch “if you hate any particular group don’t move here because chances are they will be living within 50 feet of you.” I know I scared off some brothers from Edison Park who were looking at condos. I don’t think they liked the idea of living anywhere where the spectrum of skin colors wasn’t “pasty to slightly less pasty.” Their realtor gave me a very nasty look.

  Time will tell. Will Pilsen vaguely resemble the Wicker Park of 2002 in 2018? I don’t think so. Will it in 2023 or 2028? If I were a betting kinda guy I would say it likely will.

  The pace may be quicker or it may be slower, but I think the rough eventual outcome of what Pilsen will be like is an almost foregone conclusion.

  As time goes on the last remnants of the black clad hipsters will be priced outta Wicker Park and will move to other areas.

  I’m just glad they aren’t in Uptown to any extent. I hate Illinois Hipsters.

• I am familiar with the study Joe. And while I understand just what you’re saying, consider that UIC is a lot like a tobacco company skirting health issues by dumping money into programs aimed at keeping kids from smoking. On the one hand, UIC wants to continue its expansion. And parallel to that hand, Big Tobacco wants people to continue to smoke. But on those other two parallel hands, UIC needs to keep driving south, east and west, and Big Tobacco needs to keep people smoking. Granted, I’ve never seen a four-handed man, but I have seen plenty of men talk out of both sides of their mouths. UIC has done it once when they broke ground the first time, and if the past ten years tell us anything, they’re doing it again.

• UICstudent,

  Are you suggesting that the professor in your department who conducted the study was somehow shilling for a hidden UIC agenda? Hard to believe.

  The Dan Ryan blocks UIC expansion to the east, University Village and the railroad tracks block it to the south, and the Eisenhower blocks it to the north. What does that leave?

• The real hipsters are out of Wicker Park Irishpirate. Some have gone to Uptown, others have gone west, and a lot more have gone south.

  Wicker Park and Bucktown were a lot like Pilsen because they had a very strong Hispanic presence. Specifically, they served as an outpost for Puerto Ricans after they were pushed out of Lincoln Park. That and the proximity to Humboldt Park made that a very strong collective block of Puerto Rican people from basically Racine to Kedzie. Of course there were blacks and a few ethnic whites sprinkled in (stronger in some areas than others), but the overal area was no stronger in a Hispanic sense than Pilsen is today. On the streets, there are the Hispanics. But on the titles are Mexicans, Ethnic whites and whites. The change comes in the form of that handful of urban pioneers, and those art-types seeking cheap rent and good access to the city. All of these things are in place, and not just in East Pilsen.

• Irish, the only disclaimer you need add to “will Pilsen vaguely resemble the Wicker Park of 2002 in 2018? I don’t think so. Will it in 2023 or 2028? If I were a betting kinda guy I would say it likely will.” is, if Chicago gets the Olympics all bets are off.

• The economic engine that is UIC doesn’t stop at 16th Street Joe. Students are living in Pilsen, and support the community’s stores.

  The suggestion of going east is hyperbole, as there is a barren stretch of used railroad and a river all the way to Clark Street, but there are several buildings that are part of the UIC campus north of the Eisenhower.

• Can the Pilsen Slav please tell me what is going on at Thalia and down the street where the 18th Street Cafe is purported to be?

• Obstacles. Small setbacks. Typical issues in retail and restaurant development that eventually are overcome. Saying more than that would violate the privacy of the parties involved.

• In your opinion then, will they have a hard time getting a liquor license, given the city’s recent history, and the alderman’s supposed fear of creating a whiter Pilsen?

• I have no opinion in the matter you refer to.

• PilsenSlav,

  pray tell? What impact do you think the Olympics would have on Pilsen? Positive or negative?

  As for the UIC comment on hipsters in Uptown that is just flat out wrong. There are a few, but very few. If anything the number has gone down.

  As for the black clad crowd in Wicker Park there numbers have undoubtedly declined, but just walking the commercial streets their presence is highly evident. Much more so than any other neighborhood. Although I agree they do seem to be moving west and south.

• I understand PilsenSlav, so I won’t press the matter any further.

  I understand also what you are saying about Wicker Park Irish, but the dark-clad ones you see walking around are not the artists of old. These are the newly-minted post-hipsters, the ones who do no art, know no art, and live on the fringes of what’s left of the old Wicker Park (RIP). There are very few businesses left in Wicker Park that cater to them anymore. But, surprise, surprise, Logan Square, Humboldt Park, Pilsen and Bridgeport, do have them.

  I didn’t say they were swarming Uptown, just that there were a few.

  As for the Olympics coming to town and “all bets are off,” the way I interpret PilsenSlav’s comments are that it will be inevitable, and probably at an accelerated pace. If Chicago gets the Olympics, most of Chicago will finally see a break from the softening market, and some areas, particularly those to the south and slightly to the westwill see things really pick up right after the announcement in 2009. But that is just my opinion.

• Perhaps Pilsen is changing in a way no one alluded to.

• Perhaps not.

  Pilsen’s only the first stop on an annual road show:

  “In future years DMC will be held in various neighborhoods around the city …”

• I’m sure the bangers in Pilsen will be happy to hear that it is a one time thang.

  Some of those women on the Myspace page would probably take some territory from them.

• Two points:

  1. Pilsen does not in any way look like the Wicker Park of the early 90s. By then, Wicker Park was already a prime hipster haven, though they were probably not a majority. Pilsen isn’t there yet.

  2. Uptown is attracting a lot of hipsters these days. Dollop, a coffee shop near my block, has tranformed from a neighborhood place to a major hipster destination. A few old Wicker Park/Bucktown businesses (Nick’s, the Holliday Club, Silver Cloud) have even set up shop in Uptown. I don’t think Uptown is the new Wicker Park by any means, but we can definitely add a significatn hipster presence to the long list of peoples who call Uptown home.

• Anyone want to explain what they mean by “hipster” here?

  Is it an artistic type of person with no craft, or some general term being thrown around describing white people in their mid-20s, underemployed people in the service industry who have some college education, a combo thereof or what?

• Anyone under 40 with bohemian sympathies counts, I think. Most “hipsters” in Chicago seem to be Bobo types, in that they have one foot in bohemia and the other in the bourgeoisie.

• Is a trucker’s cap obligatory?

  Is there a quota on how much Old Style or PBR one must drink each week?

  Minimum of days a week without showering?

  Minimum weekly number of burritos eaten after 2 am?

  These are important questions, I think.

• How important is an asymmetrical haircut?

• Is that hipster or new wave?

• There’s a book out there called the “Hipster Handbook” that settles all of these questions. My sister-in-law sent us a copy a few years ago because she thinks we’re hipsters. You see, she lives in Cleveland, and almost all Chicagoans look like hipsters compared to people from Cleveland.

• I guess defining “hipster” would help.

  Deceased Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart defined obscenity as “I know it when I see it”.

  That would be my description of “hipster”.

  By the way I see Nick’s Uptown and the nearby Holiday Club more as hangouts for the post frat boy crowd, but I’ve only been in either place a few times.

• From today’s NYT Travel Section, “But Pilsen, on the city’s near southwest side, may be the neighborhood that is most closely identified with Latin Chicago. Always working class, initially Czech, and now 100 years or so old, Pilsen is mostly a neighborhood of modest cottages and three-flats — the Chicago term for a detached three-family house. For every trendy restaurant or shop in the conspicuously gentrifying area, there remains at least a dozen stores very plainly serving local residents. It remains perhaps 90 percent Latino, and it is mostly Latinos who run those welcoming coffeehouses, upscale restaurants and trendy new stores. But apartments in the area are being fixed up, and higher rents are squeezing out some residents. Anglo newcomers in their 20s and 30s are out and about, jogging and walking their dogs.

  “Right now we’re co-existing,” said Sylvia Rivera, general manager of a youth-programmed radio station, WRTE-FM (www.wrte.org), based in Pilsen and owned by the National Museum of Mexican Art. “Hopefully, we’ll be able to do that and share, as well.””

• I don’t trust the New York Times too much. I remember two summers ago when they did a profile of a local actor who grew up in the city, and built a very successful career out in Los Angeles. But their points of reference to his upbringing were way off base. Still, it’s nice to see that someone else is taking notice of the area. I suspect that the 90-percent of the neighborhood residents being Hispanic is probably a lot closer to 80 or 85-percent.

• Trucker caps are out Carter. Only the kids in Wicker Park are wearing those these days, and the last time I checked, they were part of the arts scene.

• I actually alway like the falsehood that Pilsen was “always working class” as if no Czech or Slav ever owned anything including the money making buildings. The builder of Thalia Hall was “working class”, the lumber yard owners, “working class”, the owner of the taverns, “working class”, the butchers “working class”, everyone who lived her working class. All laborers. What farce.

• Danny Solis? Working Class, his sister too.